“The Effects Of Color On Personality And Relationships ”

“The Effects of Color on Personality and Relationships ” Colorado Christian University When dealing with interpersonal relationships people’s personalities are a large part of how people get along. When you meet a new person you may say that you “hit it off” or that “you just clicked”; this is due to how each other’s personalities coincide with one another’s. People’s personalities are impacted by there surroundings. This paper will discuss how color affects people’s moods and personalities. All people are affected by their surroundings. Emily Landen after a pilgrimage to several third world countries stated, “the children were so malnourished that it made me physically ill to continue to be around them everyday.” This is just a brief example of how one’s surroundings can affect not only a person’s psychological health but their physical health as well. It is the findings of this author that subtle things like color can affect a person’s personality. At times in our busy lives it is sometimes easy to overlook some of the little things that may cause influence on how we interact with our wives and children. After much consideration value was found for the argument that there are influences on us daily by the colors that we surround our selves with. Interesting to thing that the color that we paint our rooms may influence whether or not we have a good day at work or whether or not we are in a great mood when we get home. The first known studies of color were done in ancient Greece by Aristotle, theorized that color existed in the form of rays sent down from the heavens by God. His theory was not disputed until the Renaissance when Aguilonius and Sigfrid Forsius developed more sophisticated color systems. Aguilonius's system was the first attempt at defining all colors and was based on his observations of the changing color of the sky from dawn to dusk The world is full of beautiful colors. Colors have subtle effects on our moods everyday. Psychologists have long since theorized that people's preferences for color and color mixes have deep physiological affects on you mood or feeling. In fact, research does suggest that color can affect your being and that your choice of color or combinations of color is significant to your mood. An example of this is that healthy people will prefer colors and color mixtures that reflect their health both physically and mentally. Furthermore, your color preferences are not necessarily fixed and that they will vary even within a given day depending on your mood. An evaluation of what each color must be made. The uses of color have spanned many area. Color has been used for years in medical treatments around the world. Before we can discuss how these colors affect us we must first examine what each color represents independently. Red is the color of energy, vitality and power. It is used for burning out cancer, drying up weeping sores or wounds, etc.; it will warm cold areas to reduce pain. Red is a powerful healing agent for healing diseases of the blood and circulation. It will help with depression. Red is not to be used on people with high blood pressure or anxiety. If you stay under the red ray too long or are exposed to red for a considerable time it will make you very agitated or even aggressive. Orange is also a color of energy. It is used to increase immunity, to increase sexual potency, to help in all digestive ailments, chest and kidney diseases. Orange will have a gentle warming effect if used lightly. Orange, like red should not be used for too long. It is not a good color for nervy people or people easily agitated. Yellow is the color of intellect and it is used for mental stimulation, it will help you think quicker. It is good for clearing a foggy head. To help cure dermatitis and other skin problems and again it must be used carefully because it is very stimulating and it could cause exhaustion and depression. Green is the color of harmony and balance. It is good for tired nerves and it helps with the heart area. It will balance the emotions and bring about a feeling of calmness. Green is a good general healing color because it stimulates growth so it is good for helping heal broken bones, regrowth of tissue of all kinds. Green is a good color for pregnant women to help create an atmosphere of serenity and calm. Too much green may create more negative energy if there is some already present in the person being treated. Blue is the color of truth, serenity and harmony, by helping to soothe the mind. Blue is good for cooling, calming, reconstructing and protecting. Blue will help feverish conditions, it will help stop bleeding and it will help with nervous irritations. It is very good for burns. Too much blue could leave you cold, depressed and sorrowful. Indigo is the higher aspect of blue, so it will have all the attributes of blue plus it is very good for the head. It will clear a congested head to allow a clearer path for the conscious to the spiritual self. It is used for the diseases of the ears, nose and eyes. Plus it is very good for sinus. Indigo is a good astringent and it is a good purifier. Too much indigo could give you a headache and it could make you very drowsy. Purple is also a color that will connect you with your spiritual self. It is good for mental and nervous problems. It will assist very well with rheumatism and epilepsy. Helps with pain, is used in deep tissue work and helps heal the bones. Too much purple and you don't tend to live in this world. Lavender is the color of equilibrium, and it helps with spiritual healing. It is used as a tranquillizer and it will aid sleep. It is a color of replenishing and rebuilding. It is like a tonic for the body. Too much will make you very tired and disoriented. White is the color of purity. It will purify the body on the highest levels. It is the highest charging field to bring peace and comfort at the highest level. White is the best reliever of pain. Silver is the color of peace and persistence. It is the major purging color so it is very good for removing unwanted diseases and troubles from the body. It is best for cancer of tissue and blood. Gold is the strongest color to help cure all illness. It is so strong that many people are not able to tolerate it, so people have to be conditioned to gold over a period of time. Gold strengthens all fields of the body and spirit. Black: is a color that is not used very often but it will help bring a patient to a state of grace. It will help them reach the silence and the peace of God. For example, women are more aware of color and prefer red to blue while men prefer blue to red. Elderly people have a significant preference for light colors over darker ones. People with schizophrenia tend to prefer neutral colors such as white, black, brown, and gray. People with bipolar disorder and mentally healthy individuals tend to prefer chromatic hues such as red, yellow, green and blue. Red and yellow aren't the only warm colors; nor are blue and green the only cool ones. There are warm and cool versions of all colors. It depends on what other hues a color contains. Green with more blue in it will seem cooler than a green with more yellow. Often, more might be just a few drops of a cool or warm color. Nowhere can this be better seen that in the great variety of white paints. Cool whites have the slightest bluish or purplish cast, while warm whites might carry a tinge of pink, yellow, red, or orange. These little differences in quantity can make a big difference in the way a color is perceived. The definition of color is different depending on the culture that a person lives in. What may indicate danger in our culture may indicate extreme joy in another culture. I have found in my research that many colors have different meanings in different places. In broad way hues in the red area of the color wheel are called Òwarm, Ó while those in the blue and green range are referred to as Òcool. Ó These terms are relative rather than absolute. Faber Birren defines this commonalty of the colors of the spectrum by associating each with two moods. The warm colors are active and exciting such as a red and its neighboring hues. The cool colors, which are passive and calming, are blue, violet and green. Likewise, light colors are active, while deep colors are likely to be passive. Modern researchers in Japan put their finger on this point precisely. For example, Choku Akashi (1986) demonstrates a number of his research results, which imply that red is often felt to be active and may be connected in some circumstances with aggressive. In contrast to the warm colors, the cool colors are inactive or passive (see figure-2.) Faber Birren said Òthe rather strong observation is to be made that division of the spectrum into warm and cool colors holds very evident and simple meaning with reference to human personality. Indeed, though the conclusion may be largely empirical, warmth and coolness in color are dynamic qualities, warmth-signifying contact with environment, coolness signifying withdrawal into oneself. In conclusion, emotionally the red is exciting the blue is subduing. Physically and physiologically, the same sort of complementation exists. Red colors tend to increase bodily tension, to stimulate the autonomic nervous system, but green and blue colors release tension and have a lesser physiological effect. It is to be granted, of course, that direct connections exist between the brain and the body and that reactions take place independently of thought or deliberation. As with everything else the interpretation of color is dependent upon the culture in which someone is raised. There are many things in the world that is like this. In one culture a woman is thought of as more beautiful the more she weighs, however in the American culture there is much pressure on women to be thin. There are many examples related to men as well. One such example comes from the village of Zumbadia. Men are expected to paint their bodies with the blood of the animals that they kill. The more blood they have on their bodies when they return from a hunt the more respected they are. In America is a man were to come back from hunting covered in blood he would most likely be arrested and put into jail. From the colors on different countries flags you can see what colors are important to for each country pride. In America red, white, and blue have a certain type of significance. When a person wears these colors here they may feel a certain sense of internal pride. Proud of the nation in which they live and proud of how much our forefathers have accomplished. To illustrate the difference of how color is viewed between cultures I have inserted the following table: Color by Geography Color Western Europe & USA China Japan Middle East Danger, Anger, Stop Joy, Festive Occasions Anger, Danger Danger, Evil Caution, Cowardice Honor, Royalty Grace, Nobility, Childish, Gaiety Happiness, Prosperity Sexual Arousal, Safe, Sour, Go Youth, Growth Future, Youth, Energy Fertility, Strength Purity, Virtue Mourning, Humility Death, Mourning Purity, Mourning Masculinity, Calm, Authority Strength, Power Villainy Death, Evil Evil Evil Mystery, Evil This shows us that culture also plays a large part in how color affects us. The ancient Egyptians, Chinese, and Indians had believed in chromotherapy, or healing with colors. In chromotherapy, red is believed to stimulate physical and mental energies, yellow to stimulate the nerves, orange to stimulate the solar plexus and revitalize the lungs, blue to soothe and heal organic disorders such as colds, hay fever, and liver problems, and indigo to counteract skin problems and fevers. Most people have skeptical opinion about color healing, however, the medical profession makes use of color in certain treatments. For instance, premature babies with jaundice are cured by a chemical reaction triggered by exposure to blue light for several days. The relation between blue light and jaundice is beginning to be well understood scientifically. The research has shown that there is direct correlation between color and personality. In planning the next painting of ones house they should take this data into account. References http://www.weprintcolor.com/moodofcolour.htm http://library.thinkquest.org/50065/psych/theories.html http://www.cs.brown.edu/courses/cs092/VA10/HTML/ColorModels.html http://members.fortunecity.com/decomaniac/coloreffects.html http://www.shibuya.com/garden/colorpsycho.html Kaiser, Susan, SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY OF CLOTHING : SYMBOLIC APPEARANCES IN CONTEXT, 1989 Burlington Press, New York.